E-ZPass KO’s Bronx-Whitestone Satellite Booths

November 27th, 2013

It was the end of an era for a pair of satellite toll booths at the northbound Bronx-Whitestone toll plaza, thanks to E-ZPass. With more drivers using E-ZPass instead of cash, the booths were deemed unnecessary.

The booths, in place since the early 1980s, were put into service pre-E-ZPass. MTA Bridges and Tunnels introduced E-ZPass at our crossings in a pilot program at the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge in 1995 and at all crossings in 1996.

There are about 83,000 E-ZPass customers versus 25,000 cash customers on an average weekday at the Bronx-Whitestone Bridge.

Bridges and Tunnels’ Central Maintenance structural and roadway crews took the booths apart, removed the old concrete barriers and prepared the roadway for repaving and striping. Within days the work was done and drivers can now enjoy a smooth ride from the bridge to the north end of the Bronx-Whitestone Bridge property in both directions.

“All of this was done efficiently and while live traffic passed by uninterrupted,” said Bronx-Whitestone Bridge Operations Superintendent Frank Pascual, who monitored the action on the plaza, along with Maintenance Superintendent Harry Abdi.